LO4: Be Able To Apply Sound Assets To An Interactive Media Product Following Industry

- Be able to apply sound assets to an interactive media product following industry
practice

Asset management: importing; organising (file storage and retrieval, naming conventions)
Edit audio: audio library material, eg sound libraries, stock music assets; studio produced audio, eg
voiceovers
Apply: synchronising sounds, eg actions, onscreen movement, scenes, lip-synching; dub; embed; link to
sound file
Industry practice: reflect on finished product (compared with original intentions, fitness for purpose,
technical qualities); production skills (ideas generation, workflow and time management, technical
competence, teamwork)


Mix 1

 1) To begin with, I downloaded the tracks I chose - 'MR1101_JohnnyLokke_Full' and 'MR1110_YoungGriffo_Full', both being individual punk/rock sounding tracks.

2) After the download I loaded up Cubase Studio 5 and imported the chosen tracks.

3) After importing, I gave the original song a listen through three times, getting to know each track and familiarising myself with the mood the song brings so that I can continue it or alter it if I saw fit. I then decided that the vocals weren't necessarily 'good'; the vocalist wasn't very good with his singing voice, so I chose to go into the equaliser and edit the tone of the lead voice slightly.

4) After doing this and listening through again, I decided the intro sounded far too 'chunky' and played for too many bars without changing pattern. So I decided to remove some of the guitar out of the intro to give it a lighter sound, and then drops into a more 'full' sound after roughly 8 bars. 

5) Upon making the previous decision, I chose to add a slight fade onto the start of the previously removed tracks, so where they come in after the eighth bar they have a softer launch into the song with the fade in. 

6) When listening to the song through yet again, I had a thought about the chorus, that it sounded as though something were missing. Thinking of what to add to it, I simply went to edit it and add the Chorus effect, giving it more depth with it's slight delay, particularly on the guitars. 

7) I chose to move apart the tracks after this verse, which originally goes to a sort of solo/bridge, but I felt that the song should repeat the chorus here, so I cut the tracks in the exact spot where the instruments ended a bar together, and the vocals stopped. Moved the tracks back to create space to repeat the chorus, then went back to where the chorus is in the song, copied it out, making sure to be exact with my cutting, then copied it over to the newly created space, putting it in place to sound as though it were part of the original, being sure of having no fault in the editing. 

8) After aligning the parts of the song, I listened to it once again to make sure it fit properly, then decided the vocals were a bit out with the instruments' tone. I decided I'd go into the equaliser and change the tone up slightly, also low in the middle and then high again after, making it sound more attuned to the backing instruments supporting him. 

9) After equalising the lead vocals, I decided the backing vocals weren't clear enough to support it, so decided to lesson the distortion in the backing vocals. 

10) Feeling the remix was nearly finished, I went back through the song zoomed right in to see each individual peek of the frequencies, I aligned every track in place to make sure there isn't a frame of space between sections. 

11) The overall finished piece

Mix 2

1) I used the same original piece as last time, but instead from where I left off, I began to do new things with the intentions of making it sound like a new song; so I lengthened the intro of the song by copying the first 8 bar drums and bass section and pasting it on the 9th - 16th bars of the song.

2) I next copied the 17th - 32nd bars of the drums and bass to fit with the latened guitars for the second part of the intro, making it an overall more 'gradual build up'.



3) I moved onto the lead vocals, altering the sample's volume to make it quieter.

4) I decided this wasn't enough, so I went into the equaliser and altered the lead vocals, resulting in it having a softer sound altogether.

5) Wanting more diversity, moving the sliders on ElecGtr1 to the right side of the stereo and the slider on ElecGtr2 to the left, I gave the whole thing a less 'clustered' sound.

6) I listened through to the song again at this point, and thought that it sounded as though something was missing from the projection of the sound, so I went back into the mixer and moved ElecGtr1a and ElecGtr1b to the left side of the stereo, making it sound reinforced, supporting the whole song more.

7) I thought something sounded wrong with this still, so I chose to change ElecGtr1b to the right, whilst keeping ElecGtr1a on the left of the stereo, with the now moved ElecGtr1b making the song's intro have a more 'grand' build up in the intro.

8) Finally I listened to the song once more, considering the vocals, there was still quite a bit of distortion peeking on the audio even after my previous alterations. I selected the lead vocals track and changed it's gain to

-4.00db, making it sound softer but still powerful and appropriate for the genre.